For Honor: A Review

When For Honor was first announced, I was pretty dang stoked for it. I mean, did you watch the trailer? Did you see the beautiful graphics? Was the nerd in you drawn into the idea of exploring and mastering whatever faction you chose? Did you stress for months beforehand about which faction to swear your loyalties to? Did you get chills at the end of the trailer and get stroked that your typical, “Woe is me, I’m alone again on Valentine’s Day” would be interrupted by epic awesomeness that For Honor promised to be?

Were you also utterly disappointed?

I will be the first to admit that my disappointment was pretty much self-inflicted, as I only really watched the E3 announcement trailer before I got stoked to play it. So I really encourage you, if you’re interested, to give this game a try yourself before you make a decision on how you feel about it.

Based off that trailer, I made these assumptions: one, you get to choose a faction between Knights, Samurai and Vikings, and then you go on a campaign fighting against the other two while bringing loyalty and glory to your own faction. Two, there was this ultra baddie named Apollyon that you’d also have to face–and maybe (and just guessing here) we’d have to unite the factions to defeat her. As a fan of RPGs, I had more of a RPG vision for this game than what the game actually was: a tactical, multiplayer hack and slash.

Don’t get me wrong: this game wasn’t bad, if you were a proper gamer unlike myself and actually looked into what the game was meant to be. And I played it a couple of times and did enjoy myself, even though I sucked at it and never mastered blocking properly. I do think the combat mechanics are fascinating and complex, and offered a challenge that I quite enjoyed (and never got close to mastering). I thought the 12 class options across the three factions was really neat, though I did feel that choosing a faction was a bit pointless if I could play as any class, regardless of my allegiance. And I quickly discovered that the “storyline” mode was really just a way to preview all the different classes, while the multiplayer option was where the meat and potatoes truly lied.

I had a sweeping vision of this epic, open-world RPG where you follow your faction and your champion through epic battles and conquests while attempting to win this age old war. Paired with the beautiful graphics I’d already been teased with and the ominous threat of Apollyon, there was so much promise and hype for this game I had created in my head.

Unfortunately, the game they created didn’t match that vision. And thus, I was disappointed, to the point where I’m actually going to sell the game back and use some of that money to purchase Horizon: Zero Dawn–another new release that I was so stoked about, yet couldn’t afford thanks to buying For Honor and Mass Effect: Andromeda around the same time. It’s not that For Honor is a bad game. It’s just not my cup my tea, especially because I did the game a disservice and followed my own assumptions instead of their advertisement.

So if you like multiplayer games with complex battle systems and a strong reward for tactical prowess, then hit up For Honor. I think you’ll like it. But if you’re more of an open-world, customizable character and too-many-side-quests-to-count kind of player, then perhaps rent it to try it out before you buy.

Published by Nicole Evans

Nicole Evans is a writer of fantasy and science fiction. She is currently unpublished and is working fervently to get the "un" removed from that statement. With seven books under her belt and more on the way, she loves to write about destined heroes who fail anyway, twisting classic tropes on their heads, animals who feel more like people and, hopefully, about characters and worlds for you to have an opinion about.
She really can't wait for you to read these stories.
Considering she has run out of space for putting rejections letters up on her wall, Nicole now uses her spare time doing the typical things that nerds do: blogging, dying repeatedly during video games (which she believes is retribution for the characters' she's killed), wishing she was the character she is currently reading about and trying to fight off the real world by living in her own head, with varying degrees of success. Nicole has a degree in Creative Writing and a minor in Film and Media Studies, and works as an evening librarian assistant.
View all posts by Nicole Evans

Hi there! This is Nicole, a twenty-something all-around nerd, considering I’m a: SFF writer, freelance editor, blogger, book reviewer and a gamer. Welcome to my corner of the internet! I hope you feel welcome here as we rant about books, lament over writing and prolly get a little too personal.

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